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I.R.A.'s Political Wing Still Hopes to Join Talks

Sinn Fein, the political wing of the Irish Republican Army, has pledged to continue working for peace in Northern Ireland, despite Britain's virtual rejection of the party's latest proposal to gain a seat at peace talks.

The overall peace effort was thrown into a heightened state of uncertainty after Prime Minister John Major firmly restated in London on Thursday that only a convincing restoration of the I.R.A. cease-fire could win Sinn Fein a place at the negotiating table in Belfast.

One British official said: ''We are not trying to create further hurdles. We were restating our policy.'' He added that British officials were still prepared to talk to Sinn Fein privately about the situation.

Some officials and analysts in Dublin and Belfast said Mr. Major's statement could provoke the I.R.A. to new attacks like the series of bombings that broke the 17-month cease-fire in February.

''Nothing is moving in the peace process now,'' said one Belfast analyst, adding that I.R.A. members were now talking about a new attack in England.

The British Army today safely disposed of a 2,000-pound car bomb of the type used by the I.R.A., parked near the city of Armagh in Northern Ireland. No organization claimed responsibility for placing the bomb.

Mr. Major was responding to a new set of proposals sent to him by Gerry Adams, the Sinn Fein leader, and John Hume, the prominent mainstream Roman Catholic leader in the North. The proposals indicated that a restored cease-fire would be likely if Britain agreed to follow it immediately by admitting Sinn Fein to the broad-based talks under the chairmanship of former Senator George J. Mitchell of Maine. Those talks, in Belfast, have been stalled.

But Mr. Major said that first he would have to be convinced that the cease-fire was permanent, which would be tantamount to an I.R.A. declaration that its campaign of violence had ended forever. Such a guarantee, the Prime Minister said in Parliament, would then lead to a series of bilateral talks with Sinn Fein, but not to immediate agreement to let the party enter the broad-based talks, which began on June 10.

Martin McGuinness, the second-ranking official in Sinn Fein, said on Friday that the British ''have moved the goal posts once again,'' making it ''extremely difficult for Sinn Fein to get into the peace negotiations.''

He said the promise of talks between Sinn Fein and British officials amounted to ''all sorts of stalls and delays.'' But he concluded in an interview with the BBC that ''we in Sinn Fein will not give up.''